Excerpted from The Humanities of Diet. Manchester: The Vegetarian Society, 1914

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It is often
said, as an excuse for the slaughter of animals, that it is better
for them to live and to be butchered than not to live at all. Now,
obviously, if such reasoning justifies the practice of
flesh-eating, it must equally justify all breeding of
animals for profit or pastime, when their life is a fairly happy
one. The argument is frequently used by sportsmen, on the ground
that the fox would long ago have become extinct in this country
had not they, his true friends, "preserved" him for purposes of
sport. Vivisectors, who breed guinea-pigs for experimentation,
also have used it, and they have as much right to it as
flesh-eaters; for how, they may say, can a few hours of suffering
be set in the balance against the enormous benefit of life? In
fact, if we once admit that it is an advantage to an animal
to be brought into the world, there is hardly any treatment that
cannot be justified by the supposed terms of such a contract.

Also, the
argument must apply to mankind. It has, in fact, been the plea of
the slave-breeder; and it is logically just as good an excuse for
slave-holding as for flesh-eating. It would justify parents in
almost any treatment of their children, who owe them, for the
great boon of life, a debt of gratitude which no subsequent
services can repay. We could hardly deny the same merit to
cannibals, if they were to breed their human victims for the
table, as the early Peruvians are said to have done.

It is on
record, in no less authentic a work than "Hansard" (March 7/
1883), that when Sir Herbert Maxwell argued in Parliament that a
"blue rock" would
prefer to be sport for pigeon-shooters than not to exist at all,
Mr. W. E. Forster satirically remarked that what we have to
consider is not a blue rock before existence, but a blue
rock in existence. There, in brief, is the key to the whole
matter. The fallacy lies in the confusion of thought which
attempts to compare existence with non-existence. A person who is
already in existence may feel that he would rather have lived than
not, but he must first have the terra firma of existence to
argue from; the moment he begins to argue as if from the abyss of
the non-existent, he talks nonsense, by predicating good or evil,
happiness or unhappiness, of that of which we can predicate
nothing.

When, therefore, we talk
of "bringing a being," as we vaguely express it, "into the world,"
we cannot claim from that being any gratitude for our
action, or drive a bargain with him, and a very shabby one, on
that account; nor can our duties to him be evaded by any such
quibble, in which the wish is so obviously father to the thought.
Nor, in this connection, is it necessary to enter on the question
of ante-natal existence, because, if such existence there be, we
have no reason for assuming that it is less happy than the present
existence; and thus equally the argument falls to the ground. It
is absurd to compare a supposed preexistence, or non-existence,
with actual individual life as known to us here. All reasoning
based on such comparison must necessarily be false, and will lead
to grotesque conclusions.

Take the case, as it
stands, between the Philosopher and the Pig. Is it not adding
insult to injury that this much-massacred animal should not only
be eaten by the Philosopher, but should also be made the
subject of a far from disinterested beatification—"Blessed is the
Pig, for the Philosopher is fond of bacon."[1]
We can imagine how the Philosopher, when he passes a butcher's
shop, which, according to his showing, is a very shrine and centre
of humaneness, since without it there "would be no pigs at all,"
must pause in serene self-satisfaction to felicitate the pallid
carcase laid out there, with the mockery of an ornamental orange
in its mouth. "I have been a benefactor to this Pig," he must say,
"inasmuch as I ate a portion of his predecessor; and now I will be
a benefactor to some yet unborn pig, by eating a portion of this
one."

This, then, is the benign
attitude of the Philosopher towards the Pig; and what shall be the
reply of the Pig to the Philosopher? "Revered moralist," he might
plead, "it were unseemly for me, who am to-day a pig, and
to-morrow but ham and sausages, to dispute with a master of
ethics, yet to my porcine intellect it appeareth that having first
determined to kill and devour me, thou hast afterwards bestirred
thee to find a moral reason. For mark, I pray thee, that in my
entry into the world my own predilection was in no wise
considered, nor did I purchase life on condition of my own
butchery. If, then, thou art firm set on pork, so be it, for pork
I am: but though thou hast not spared my life, at least spare me
thy sophistry. It is not for his sake, but for thine,
that in his life the Pig is filthily housed and fed, and at
the end barbarously butchered."

From whatever point one
looks at this sophism, it is seen to be equally hollow. For even
apart from the philosophical flaw which vitiates it, there is the
practical consideration that a far greater number of human lives
can be supported on a grain and fruit-growing district than on one
which rears cattle; so that if a larger area of England were
devoted to the rearing of "livestock," we should actually be
lessening human life that there might be more beef and mutton;
that is, we should be increasing the lower existence at the
expense of the higher. It is worth noting, too, that the life of
animals doomed to the slaughter is of a far lower quality than it
would be if the same animals were either entirely wild, or
domesticated to some rational purpose by friendly association with
man; the very fact that an animal is going to be eaten seems to
remove it from the category of intelligent beings, and causes it
to be regarded as mere animated "meat." "To keep a man, slave, or
servant," says Edward Carpenter, "for your own advantage merely,
to keep an animal, that you may eat it, is a lie; you
cannot look that animal in the face." The existence of bullocks,
for example, can scarcely be called life; they are "live-stock,"
but they do not live. And what of the "fat beasts" that are
yearly exhibited at the Agricultural Hall, and elsewhere, at the
season of peace and goodwill? Are these wretched victims of human
gluttony to be grateful for the boon of life? Are crammed fowls
and Strasburg geese to be grateful? And the calf and the lamb-are
they to be felicitated on the rather short term allowed
them in the ghoulish contract, or must we except the eaters of
veal and lamb from the list of animal benefactors?

Let us heartily accept all
that may be said of "the joyfulness of life." But what is the
moral to be drawn from that fact? Surely not that we are justified
in outraging and destroying life, to pamper our selfish appetites,
because forsooth we shall then produce more of it! But rather that
we should respect the beauty and sanctity of life in others as in
ourselves, and strive as far as possible to secure its fullest
natural development. This logic of the larder is the very negation
of a true reverence for life; for it implies that the real lover
of animals is he whose larder is fullest of them:

He prayeth best, who
eateth best

All things both great and
small.

It is the philosophy of
the wolf, the shark, the cannibal. If there be any truth in such
an argument, let those who believe it have the courage of their
convictions, and face the inevitable conclusion. The Ogre has
hitherto been a much misunderstood character, but now at last
Philosophy and Science are doing justice to his beneficence. His
organization has been defective, perhaps, but his spirit has been
wholly commendable. He is par excellence the zoophilist,
the philanthropist, the saint.[2]

But enough of this
quibbling! Vegetarianism would save the actual animals, who have
been brought into this actual world, from the very real suffering
that is inseparable from the cattle-ship and the slaughterhouse;
and if its only inhumanity is that which it perpetrates on
nonexistent races by not arranging for their birth, it may bear
the charge with equanimity. If there were any unkindness, or any
lack of kindness, in not breeding animals, the enormity of
our sins of omission would be more than the human conscience could
endure, for the number of the unborn is limitless, and to wade
through slaughter to a throne, "and shut the gates of mercy on
mankind," would be a trifle in comparison with this cold-blooded
shutting of the gates of life on the poor, neglected nonexistent !

It is interesting to note
that this fallacy—the assumption that it is a kindness to
bring a being into the world—is as old as the time of Lucretius,
who deals with it, in another connection, in a passage of his
great philosophical poem, De Rerum Natura (v. 176-180),
which may be rendered thus:

What loss were ours, if we
had known not birth?

Let living men to longer
life aspire,

While fond affection binds
their hearts to earth:

But whoso ne'er hath
tasted life's desire,

Unborn, impersonal, can
feel no dearth.

We see, then, that a
vulgar sophism of to-day was clearly exposed nearly two thousand
years ago. It is quite possible that fools may be repeating it two
thousand years hence.

[1]
"Of all the arguments for Vegetarianism none is so weak as the
argument from humanity. The pig has a stronger interest than
anyone in the demand for bacon. If all the world were Jewish,
there would be no pigs at all."—Leslie Stephen in "Social
Rights and Duties."

"If
all the world were Jews, it has been well said, there would be
no pigs in existence; and if all the world were Vegetarians,
would there be any sheep or cattle, well cared for, and
guarded against starvation?"—Professor D. G. Ritchie in
"Natural Rights."

[2]
"If the motive that might produce the greatest number of the
happiest cattle would be the eating of beef, then beef-eating,
so far, must be commended. And while, heretofore, the motive
has not been for the sake of cattle, it is conceivable that,
if Vegetarian convictions should spread much further, love for
cattle would (if it be not psychologically incompatible) blend
with the love of beef in the minds of the opponents of
Vegetarianism. With deeper insight, new and higher motives may
replace or supplement old ones, and perpetuate but ennoble
ancient practices."—Dr. Stanton Coit.